Hum Lynam

September 24th 1920

1 Comment

Mr AE LYNAM (Hum)

The Christmas Term started yesterday with my brother Hum at the helm, following my announcement of semi-retirement at the end of last term.

We now number 192 children with a further 20 in the junior ‘Baby School’ – this compared with under 60 when I took over the running of the School in 1886!

This term sees some changes in the boarding houses. Mr & Mrs Brown have charge of boarders at 10 Charlbury Road. Mr Bye, having been appointed headmaster of Thame Grammar School, Mr Stradling from the Royal Naval College Osborne, has taken on his house for juniors at 12 Bardwell Road. Miss Field is now running a house for ‘Baby School’ boarders and a few sisters – altogether 4 boys and three girls. This meets a serious need. Parents living in India are glad to be able to leave even young children in so homely an atmosphere.

Lastly:

We have decided to revert to the old name of the School, viz, the Dragon School, Oxford, instead of the Oxford Preparatory School. The boys have always been the ‘Dragons,’ but the School has come to be known as ‘Lynams’ or ‘the OPS,’ and we prefer ‘the Dragons.’

 

 

July 25th 1920

Leave a comment

Jack Smyth has rounded off a remarkable week with his marriage to Miss Margaret Dundas on Thursday (July 22nd). We sent off Hum and Mrs Hum, resplendent in wedding garments and looking ‘buxom, blithe and debonair‘ to represent us. One observer commented “Hum’s topper recalled the delicious blends of thirty years ago and his smile overflowed the taxi.”

What a pity to find in the newspaper that Mr & Mrs Hum (and their daughter Audrey) Lynam has been misspelt as Lyman!

July 23rd 1920

3 Comments

July 21st 1920 – Prize-giving Day.

The Prize-giving this year was decidedly the best we have ever had; and it was a great joy to me to be present among the audience (for the reason, see below). If I had realised that Hum was such an orator he would have been turned on on many previous occasions!

We were also delighted to welcome back Jack Smyth, fresh from Buckingham Palace (again) to give away the prizes. He was kept on his feet some time as there were some 182 of them!

The final presentation was that of the Somerville Officers’ Cup. As required, it was awarded to the boy who ‘has the most gentlemanly bearing and best influence on other boys’ as decided on by the vote of the whole school. This year’s winner is Francis Wylie, who sadly leaves us now to go to Rugby.

Jack Smyth and Hum Lynam with Francis Wylie

Our guest then proceeded to make his speech and Old Jack’s soldier-like “few words” were exactly all that was wanted to complete the success of the day, including, as it did, this touching tribute to the school and those we have lost:

“I needn’t tell you how much we ODs who are stranded out in India look forward to coming back to the OPS. There is something quite different about the OPS from any other preparatory school I have ever heard of. Someone said at the Old Boys’ Dinner that the remarkable thing about the OPS was that ODs have almost as much affection for it as they have for their public schools. Well, I should like to go one better and say that, as far as my experience goes, ODs have more affection for the OPS than they have for their public school. And to say that is to say a great deal, because I have never known a preparatory school where that has occurred before.

Before I left India I met one or two people who had just returned from leave in England and they gave one rather a depressing account of things at home. They said that the old spirit of unselfishness and cheerfulness which had burnt so brightly during the war, had rather died out, that our sacrifices in the war had been forgotten, and that there was generally rather a spirit of Bolshevism abroad. Now, I’m glad to say I haven’t found that at all. We as a nation are not given to talking sentiment and weeping for sorrows that are past, but I think that the sacrifices England made in the great war have been in no way forgotten because we don’t talk about them, and I know at any rate that the wonderful example set us by that gallant band of ODs who so gladly and ungrudgingly laid down their lives for their country in the great war will be an ever existing memory at the OPS.”

They will indeed not be forgotten. A brass, prepared by Messrs. Mowbray, is already fixed in the School Hall. It gives the names of our lost ones in the order in which they fell.  Hopefully our Memorial Cross will be ready for its installation on the banks of the Cherwell before the end of the year.

Lastly, why was I in the audience this year?

At the age of 62 and after 40 years schoolmastering in Oxford I feel that the School should be run by younger men, so I have got Hum to be Joint Headmaster, and am leaving the greater part of the management of the School to him. He with the stalwarts, GC Vassall and Lindsay Wallace, with the help of Mr Haynes and the younger men (not forgetting the ladies) will, I am certain, maintain the traditions and carry on the success of the School.

I still hope to spend some happy years in the position of (shall I say?) Warden of the School – and do some teaching and supervision and to keep up intimate connection with Old Boys and Girls – but I do not want to interview or correspond with new people; I cannot pretend to know intimately all the boys as I have always done in the past, and I do not mean to interfere with details or with general management. I once heard a splendid little girl of 9 say, when it was suggested that she should carve a ham, “All right, give me plenty of elbow room and NO ADVICE!” meaning of course, “no interfering and unasked-for advice,” and there is much justice in the demand!

 

 

June 8th 1919

Leave a comment

On the second anniversary of the death of Humphrey Arden (June 6th 1917) a Calvary has been dedicated in his memory in Yoxall Churchyard in Staffordshire. The Bishop of Stratford carried out the dedication in the presence of many relatives and friends, amongst whom were Hum and me.

The Calvary was erected by Messrs Bridgeman of Lichfield (who are to erect the OPS Memorial Cross). It stands 23 feet high and dominates the village street.

The inscription reads: “In thanksgiving to Almighty God for the beautiful life and glorious death of Humphrey Warwick Arden, BA Cantab. Killed at Messines, June 6th, 1917, aged 25. Laid to rest at Bailleul, France. Sed miles, sed pro patria. RIP.”

The following tribute to Humphrey is from the ‘Church Times’:

“He was one of those whose lives gave promise of a brilliant future. A Cambridge Honours man, a great athlete, a musician of no mean promise, one who exercised extraordinary influence on his fellow men, a lover of all the arts and of everything beautiful, great things were expected of him had he been spared.

A week before his death his fellow officers unanimously decided to recommend him for the MC which had been offered to the battery.

The Calvary was erected by his parents in Yoxall, where his grandfather, Dr Lowe, was rector for many years, and where twelve  generations of Ardens lie buried under the high altar.”

December 19th 1918

Leave a comment

THE PIRATES OF PENZANCE

Due to disruptions caused by the ‘flu’, the play this term, which was Gilbert & Sullivan’s ‘The Pirates of Penzance,’ had to be delayed until the very last day of term.

Our reviewer was most generous in his remarks:

“Beginning with diffidence, they gathered confidence as they progressed and ended with ‘brio’ on a note of almost boisterous hilarity.”

A number were singled out for their performances, including Ruth (J. Betjemann):

“A pleasing buxom wench was Ruth, who scored a great success in the part of ‘Maid of all work.’ Always perfectly self-possessed, she enunciated her lines with a clearness which even in that company was remarkable.”

* * * * * *

The holidays ahead – the first ones in which we can all enjoy peacetime pleasures since the summer of 1914 – we hope will be healthy ones too.

As Hum Lynam, writing in ‘House Notes’ for the ‘Draconian’ points out, we have been very lucky this term:

“The Armistice Term was also the ‘Flu’ Term and will be remembered as the first occasion on which the boarders have been sent home during term time. It was a preventative measure, which was fully justified by results, and we were heartily thankful that we were spared the anxieties and prolonged interruption of work, which were the lot of many schools. Except for a few mild cases of ‘flu’ just before we dispersed, we have been entirely free from illness.”

October 20th 1918

Leave a comment

Daily Telegraph 17/10/18

The death of Fluff Taylor strikes at the heart of the OPS family and both my brother Hum and I would like to record our thoughts and appreciation of his life as a pupil, colleague and friend.

Fluff Taylor attended the OPS from 1882-86, coinciding with my arrival at the school (then at 17 Crick Road, Oxford) in 1882.

Fluff, as a Dragon

I can see Fluff now with his reddish curly rough hair and his honest freckled face and bright dancing eyes, dressed in a sailor suit. I used to put him up on a desk in the old school at Crick Road and he sang ‘Kitty Wells’ and recited the ‘Wreck of the Hesperus’ most pathetically.

Then later he was our swimming instructor and started the tradition of fearless diving which has been maintained ever since. In those days the Lodge was a merry place and Fluff was the life of it. Then we heard of his exploits in the Himalayas when fighting fierce tribesmen; the Boer War (which claimed the life of his brother, Rex), Graspan and Magersfontein, then colonial work in Nigeria.

When the Great War came he rejoined the Army, was wounded, went back again and after winning many decorations was hit by shrapnel under his helmet on October 1st.

During all those years he constantly came back to his old school, always the same old Fluff. He chummed with different generations of boys, he got them countless ‘halves’ and ‘no preps’; he told them grand yarns, he pillow-fought in the dorms…  There was always a thrill of delight when GC (Mr Vassall) told us that Fluff was coming.

And always he took me with him to the beautiful cemetery at Holywell and laid wreaths of flowers on the graves of his father and brother; and then he would talk to me of higher things, of the mysteries of life here and hereafter – and lately he always came back in our talks to the absolutely magnificent behaviour of his men – their humour, their readiness to make the best of things and such awful things, their refusal to give in to hunger and sleeplessness and awful sounds and sights; he told me how anxious they were about his welfare and that of other officers.

‘Tommy,’ like the boys and myself, never had a dearer or truer or warmer-hearted friend. His resting place is at La Kreule, but his spirit is ever with us to inspire and to cheer and to love.

My brother, Hum Lynam has written:

Hum Lynam

“In Bedford and Sandhurst days his buoyant spirit, supported by a high reputation as a footballer, won him great influence in School and College. But he was no mere jolly athlete. He won a Scholarship at Bedford and the School Prize for Latin Verse. He quoted Latin in letters from India, with just enough degree of error to prove the genuineness of his knowledge. His descriptions of the antiquities of Crete, his poems, his plea for the serious study of French, showed clearly the instinct of a scholar…

He once wrote a letter to the Draconian to protest that ‘none of the boys (as shown in a photo of the School XI which he had recently received) appears to possess a brush and comb.’ The protest is characteristic. As a soldier he knew and taught the importance of attention to detail: and in one of the best sermons we ever heard – which Fluff preached on March 4th 1917 – he elaborated this point to the complete conviction of right roughest-haired Dragon in the room.”

As our friend, Archer Vassall, has observed,

“There is no Dragon out of the whole number serving who was more intimately bound to the School.”

 

 

 

July 11th 1917

6 Comments

With mild mumps and some German measles prevalent, it has not been possible to arrange cricket matches against other schools this term.

The situation has been saved by our old friend Nurse, now Sister Wilkinson, who left us in 1914 to work in the Base Hospital and is now working at Somerville College. (The college, being next door to the Radcliffe Infirmary was taken over by the military in 1915 to provide accommodation for wounded officers).

We were visited a couple of years ago by groups of wounded soldiers, who bowled and batted in the nets and now, thanks to Sister Wilkinson, teams of wounded officers from Somerville have been regular visitors.

As Chris Jacques (who is leaving us at the end of this term to go to Repton) has recorded:

“An experimental match was played against ‘Sister Wilkinson’s XI,’ who was in charge of Dragon boarders before the war. Some of the visiting batsmen needed a runner, some of their bowlers had to dispense with a run-up, and they were suitably handicapped in the field – and the game was so much enjoyed by both sides that it was repeated each week for the rest of the term, with the visitors bringing, wheeling and even carrying more and more supporters with them each time.

In the evening bathe that followed each match, we were joined by those of our opponents who had Sister Wilkinson’s permission, and by one or two more who had arranged for her attention to be distracted.”

As popular as the cricket matches were, the teas were perhaps even more enjoyed – particularly by me and the macaws:

Bath-chair cases were very grateful to Mrs Vassall and her lady helpers. Instead of being wheeled along dusty streets, obtaining in the process parched throats and having to swallow mouthfuls of ‘petrofine,’ several have been able to sit in comfortable surroundings, watch the cricket and enjoy themselves thoroughly.

I think that the matches have been at least as good for the boys, and in many ways more enjoyable, than the usual matches with other schools.

 

Hum Lynam (top right) with young Dragons and old soldiers…

May 9th 1917

3 Comments

No-one went off to war with a heavier heart than our own Pug – Lieut. Lindsay Wallace (OBLI) – being a Dragon, man and boy.

Since he left our Staff he has managed a number of visits, much to the delight of the boys. Last term he talked to them on the subject “With the troops in training” and they were intrigued by his description of the workings of the Mills bomb.

Pug has now returned to active service and even if, dare I say it, the OPS is not always the tidiest of places, the contrast between home and the Front is a stark one.

28/4/17 “We started off yesterday from the base and were told we would take about two days to reach our division.

Three of us had a first-class compartment to ourselves. We managed to get some tea and cake before leaving the station and then started on our journey very slowly indeed at about 4 p.m.

I have never seen such a sight as the sides of the line, in some places they are layers deep in tins of all descriptions thrown out of the carriages. This doesn’t apply to one particular spot but all along the line: without exaggeration there must have been millions of tins.

Also all along the line were kids who kept shouting ‘bisceet,’ and they generally got one. In many places there were German prisoners, who got cigarettes thrown to them…

After quite a good meal, which was helped on very much by heating up a meat tin over my cooker, we all settled down to sleep and I was very glad to have quite a good night.

Then all of a sudden we were woken up, about 5.30, and all told to get out. We got up and packed our various belongings and turned out, and there we were, right in it: almost every house is blown to bits, some have the walls standing and a few have the roof left in places.

It was a bit of a shock getting out of the train into a sort of shattered world.”

 

I have picked out this picture to remind us all of happier times.

It was taken by our VC hero, Jack Smyth outside The Lodge a few years before the war, and shows three stalwarts of my Staff: my brother Hum (AE Lynam), Pug (WJL Wallace) and Cheese (GC Vassall).

It seems a long time ago and from a different world now.